Waltham Abbey is absolutely steeped in history with most of it surrounding Waltham Abbey Church, which was a surviving Norman church from the abbey dissolved by King Henry VIII. There are plenty of highlights along this leisurely Essex walk which includes the Royal Gunpowder Mills, plenty of rural countryside walking routes and the popular Lee Valley Regional Park.

We parked at Cornmill Meadows car park and then walked to the gravel path at the signpost where we then walked straight ahead through the woodland to join the stream at Cornmill. At Cornmill stream we turned right so that the stream was on our left hand side as we followed it down to the footbridge where we then turned right to then walk next to the Royal Gunpowder Mills fence.

Walks And Walking – Essex Walks – Royal Gunpowder Mills Ruins

With the Royal Gunpowder Mills fence to our left hand side we continued our walk until we reached the cross field pathway to the next woodland area, Alder Forest, where we then followed the field edge track with the small stream on our left hand side which was signposted to Hook Marsh.

We then turned left on to Fishers Green Lane and on to a car park with a notice board where we carried straight on to cross over two footbridges across streams to a kissing gate signposted on the right hand side to Ware. We followed the gravel track to the picnic area next to Seventy Acres Lake on our left hand side in the Lee Valley Regional Park.

We continued walking along the gravel track until we reached a signpost for Lee Valley Park farms and Nazeing to then cross the footbridge where we then turned left where we then passed Bittern Watchpoint where we then reached the access road to the electricity sub-station. We then continued our walking route along the riverside path to a tarmaced road.

Walks And Walking – Essex Walks – Lee Valley Regional Park

We then turned right and then left through the kissing gate and contiued to walk straight ahead where we passed a bird watching station on our left which overlooks the marshland. At the entrance to the Lee Valley Sailing Club we walked over two stiles to our right hand side and then walked along the edge of the field with the Lee Valley Sailing Club on our left hand side.

We continued along this pathway as it started to bear right climbing slighlty upwards until we reached the next stile at the top where we then followed the signpost to Clayton Hill. At the kissing gate we then crossed over the wooden footbridge to Coleman’s Shaw where we then turned right and onto the B194 road which we then walked downhill to a T-junction.

We then turned left at the Coach and Horses Pub crossing over the road to Waltham Road and then uphill passing Denver Lodge Farm on our right hand side to then cross a stile on our right following the edge of the field track where we then reached Galleyhill Wood. We then crossed the next stile and continued our walk with the woodland on our right hand side to a break in the trees which we then walked through turning right at the path crossing to join a wide grassy green lane path to Aimes Green.

Although quite leisurely we were now starting to feel the benefit of this walking route (What I really mean is starting to feel quite tired!) and we were qwuite pleased to be in the last short section of this walk. We then turned right just after Aimes green before turning left at the houses and on to Claygate Lane and out by Eagle Lodge where we then crossed over the Crooked Mile Road to a meadow. We then turned left through the kissing gate and back to the car park some 3 hours and just over 7 miles later.